Delhi CM Atishi calls MCD standing committee polls ‘illegal, unconstitutional and undemocratic’; announces the transfer of the Supreme Court

New Delhi: Delhi Chief Minister Atishi on Saturday launched a scathing attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party, calling the MCD standing committee elections held on Friday “illegal, unconstitutional and undemocratic”.

She read the Municipal Corporations Act of 1957 and stated that the right to call elections rested solely with the mayor.

“The MCD elections conducted by the BJP are illegal, unconstitutional and undemocratic. Our nation operates in accordance with the constitution and the principles set out in the constitution. The Parliament has passed an Act, the Delhi Municipal Corporation Act, 1957. Under this Act, there are many rules, laws, regulations under which the MCD operates,” the Delhi Chief Minister said during a press conference.

“First of all, it is clearly written in the rules that the elections will be held at the Corporation meeting. Secondly, in Regulations 3, section 2 states that only the mayor has the right to decide on the time, place and date of the elections. Thirdly, Art. Section 76 of the DMC Act clearly states that whenever a meeting is held, the mayor will be the chairman and if the mayor is absent, his deputy will be the chairman. “It’s not what I said, the law says it, the Act says it, the rules and regulations in the Act say it, but the BJP doesn’t care about the constitution, laws or even destroying democracy,” she added.

Earlier on Friday, Sunder Singh of the BJP won the MCD standing committee elections.

The AAP had expressed strong reservations over the election to one vacant post on the MCD Standing Committee, but the elections were held on Friday in the presence of Additional Commissioner Jitendra Yadav, who was appointed chairman in the absence of the Mayor and Deputy Mayor. AAP did not participate in the elections. Delhi Mayor Shelly Oberoi directed the MCD commissioner to proceed with the election of the sixth member of the Standing Committee on October 5. The Delhi CM further stated that neither the LG nor the commissioner had the authority to order elections and despite this, the commissioner followed the LG’s order and implemented it.

“Even if the LG does not have the authority to do so, he issues an order, the commissioner, the IAS officer follows and implements the order without having any authority to do so. But this is not the first time this is happening, it is standard operating procedure of the BJP. Wherever they do not win elections, they try to force the government through the chor darwaza (thief’s door),” Atishi said.

“We saw that between 2014 and 2024, wherever the BJP lost elections, under Operation Lotus, they bought MLAs and nets, put pressure on them through CBI and ED and formed the government. They have done this in various states like Maharashtra. , Goa, Manipur etc.” – she added.

She also announced that the party would go to the Supreme Court despite the elections that took place on Friday.

“We will definitely approach the Supreme Court and a petition will be filed in the Supreme Court today as the elections held in the House of Representatives by the BJP yesterday are completely illegal. The Delhi Municipal Corporations Act makes it very clear that the power to call meetings rests only with the Mayor, the right to preside over the meeting only has the Mayor and in her absence the Deputy Mayor. Therefore, we will appeal to the Supreme Court against these undemocratic elections and today we will file a complaint regarding these illegal, unconstitutional, undemocratic elections to the Supreme Court,” said the Prime Minister.

Earlier, Delhi Mayor Shelly Oberoi also expressed concern over the recent order issued by the MCD Commissioner, stating that the scheduled election of the Standing Committee member at 1 p.m. is considered illegal and unconstitutional. She emphasized that the LG should not have the power to interfere in the functioning of the Chamber.

Criticizing the BJP for not allowing early mayoral elections, she said, “In Delhi we also saw how AAP won the MCD elections, they did not allow mayoral elections when they tried to force a councilor to vote in the elections despite having no authority to do so . We are grateful to the Supreme Court that the court conducted the elections properly. Similarly, during the Chandigarh mayoral elections, there was an attempt to rig the elections through Anil Masih.”

She then issued a ‘challenge’ to the BJP to face AAP in the elections, dissolve the MCD standing committee and hold fresh elections for the people of Delhi.

“I want to tell them that this country is not based on gundagardi, it works according to the law, it is a democracy and it works based on the voices of the people. So if you have courage, challenge AAP in the elections. If you want to hold MCD elections and then dissolve them and then let the people of Delhi decide who they want,” she said.